


Song for the Queen

by Iseult_Variante



Category: Disturbia (Music Video)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-21
Updated: 2008-12-21
Packaged: 2018-01-25 06:43:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,775
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1637123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iseult_Variante/pseuds/Iseult_Variante
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And the mob was dancing, dark and beautiful.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Song for the Queen

**Author's Note:**

> Written for sheepfairy

 

 

Day after day, caught between sanity and madness, the caged priestess sang of the past and of the future:

_... the queen, with her red, red lips ..._

... and so the dancer was granted a private audience...

... her fingers stained black from reaching into too many minds...

... yanking and pulling, rattling at the chains around her wrists and ankles...

... and the mob was dancing, dark and beautiful...

* * *

The city stood on a cliff, where the eastern desert fell down into the dark sea. It was said that long ago the city had been part of an inland empire, but the gods had grown angry with the decadence and arrogance of the people to the west and so their lands had been shaken and sundered and swept beneath the waves. There were still tremors today, but more often tremors of reality, seizures of the mind and body instead of convulsions of the earth.

During the day, the sun burned orange-brown through the thick smog rising from hundreds of vents and chimneys. The glow of the giant furnaces and boilers lit the city from the bottom upwards at night. The air always stank with burning smells and shimmered with heat. Underground, there was a warren of tunnels, a maze connecting vaulted crypts to cramped cellars. On the deepest levels were the prisons that held the enemies of the queen.

The priestess was held in a small cell. In her more lucid moments, she thought it could instead be called a large cage, and she laughed. "Oh, that the caged bird should yet sing! No choice but sing!"

She had been one of the wise, a priestess to the Goddess of Birds, who soared above the world and saw all that was, all that had been, and all that was yet to come. The goddess would send visions to those she most favored, and if you could withstand them, if you survived as your hair bleached gold and your eyes bleached white, you could rise high in the ranks of her temple. If you could use the visions, you could even find a place in the court. You could be one of the trusted few who served the queen.

The priestess laughed, curled up against the bars of her cage. Her guard shifted uncomfortably. It was late in the day, and his partner had gone on his rounds of the other prisoners.

On the more lucid days, on the days when she did not rave and sing, trapped in the past or in the future, she would speak to the guards. Sometimes she would tell them secrets of their own lives, things that they had kept hidden from everyone. Sometimes she would even tell them of their particular fates, warn them of upcoming hurts. They followed their orders: ignored her, showed no response to her words, and stood impassive even if she reached out and clutched at them. Still, they could not help but listen, and they were weakening. The goddess had shown her that some of them, including this one, had started coming to the temple, bringing grain and seeds for the pigeons and sparrows, bringing rats to bleed out on the altar.

"What is your name?" the priestess asked the guard. 

"Don't you know it already, most wise?" he replied, mockingly. He was young and nervous.

"The goddess has seen fit to show me how you betray your brother, and that the baby daughter you call niece can be cured of the rattling cough by getting her out of the city, but no, I do not know your name."

The guard paled. "My name is Marco, my lady."

She hummed. "Marco, Marco. Tell me, do you remember the old queen? Not the one who put me here, but the queen before?"

"No, my lady, I do not."

"I do, Marco, I do."

* * *

_... the queen, with her red, red lips..._

... and the mob was dancing, dark and beautiful...

When the priestess first arrived at court, she was proud. She was the most powerful seer in generations, and the queen herself had sent to the temple to summon her to an audience. As she walked along the hallways of the palace, she could already see what was to happen: she would enter the throne room with her head bowed, kneel immediately, and sing to the queen of the future, how to find hidden enemies and defeat them.

And so it went, until she finished her song. 

"Very good, little bird."

The priestess looked up, startled. Who dared address her with so little respect?

She looked up and saw the queen, with her red, red lips, and her elegant fingers. The queen was smiling faintly, touching her painted fingernails to her mouth.

Oh, thought the priestess, staring, _oh_. Her heart fluttered in her chest. "I wish only to serve, my queen."

"Well, little bird. In that case, I think you shall stay with me."

* * *

So the priestess stayed. She became a member of the innermost court, one of the three closest to the queen, along with the mistress of spies and the master of the guard.

The mistress of spies was a spinner, a servant of the Goddess of Spiders, the weaver of nets to snare and veils to hide. Her lips were painted poison black, glossy like her wavy black hair. The master of the guard was her lover, and together they had kept the queen safe.

"It will be even easier with you to help us, now," the spinner said to the priestess. "You will be able to tell us when to be careful, and who to watch most closely."

The priestess smiled, "As the goddess wills; I do not have visions of everything, you know!"

The master of the guard laughed, "You will see enough, I am sure."

It was a golden time. The priestess stayed and served the queen she loved.

Stayed and served and loved, but for nothing. The queen looked on her as a servant, but nothing more. 

The queen looked on her as a servant, and took other lovers. Still, the priestess stayed, and served, and began to hurt.

The queen smiled knowingly with her red, red lips, and called the priestess her little bird, and took her visions for granted, and took other lovers. The priestess stayed, and hurt, and began to hate.

* * *

The court was gathered for a feast, and the priestess sat with the spinner and the master of the guard at the queen's high table. 

The priestess knew that the queen's cup held poison. The vision had been clear: _the queen's latest lover was paid by an ambassador from the south. The poison would be poured into the cup before being carried to the high table. The ambassador and the false lover would flee in the confusion._

The vision had been clear, but the priestess said nothing.

The vision had been clear, but incomplete. 

The queen raised her glass in a toast to the ambassador, but hesitated. "I do not like this southern wine." She passed her cup to the master of the guards. "Is it more to your taste, brave one?"

The priestess cried out, but it was too late. He drank from the queen's poisoned cup.

He drank, and choked, and fell to the ground. The spinner tried to catch him, and fell with him to the floor. She held his head in her lap, and begged him to awaken. No one was brave enough to draw her away, and she stayed for hours as he grew stiff and pale and cold. The priestess fled back to her own chambers, horrified. 

Late that night, the spinner came to the priestess. Her eyes were full of rage, and the priestess was afraid.

"It is the queen's fault that he is dead," said the spinner. "She should not have made him drink from the cup. He should not have been poisoned."

The priestess looked into her face, and saw her own hurt and hatred mirrored there. She felt shame and relief that she was safe, and if she felt fear at what was to come, she did not notice.

* * *

"Oh, but I was wrong, Marco," the priestess sighed.

"Wrong, my lady? To betray the old queen?"

"Wrong to think that I was safe from the spinner."

* * *

_... and so the dancer was granted a private audience..._

... and the mob was dancing, dark and beautiful...

The spinner found a new queen. She was a dancer, a star of the city's great theatre house, and beloved of the people. The queen admired her, and requested a private audience. And oh, how the priestess burned with hatred.

"She is petty, and easily manipulated, but she has gifts from the gods, you see," said the spinner to the priestess. "She can reach into the mind, trap the soul on her fingers. She will be able to--"

"I do not care," interrupted the priestess. She had not been sleeping, since they had made their pact for treason. Her visions had been replaced with nightmares, nightmares where the queen teased her, kissed her with those red lips, touched her with those elegant fingers, and then laughed and turned away, left her shamed and unfulfilled. "Just get it over with, and I will say nothing, no matter what warning visions come."

And so the dancer was granted a private audience. 

And so the old queen fell under her spell, and claimed the dancer for her consort. 

And so the old queen fell into a sudden coma, and could not be woken, and died. 

And the new queen lived.

* * *

"The new queen lives but she is mad, Marco."

"That is treasonous talk, my lady, you must not say that."

The priestess cocked her head, as if listening, then waved his concerns away. "Oh, we will be alone for a while yet, there is only you to hear. How is your daughter-niece?"

"She is well, my lady. Her family has gone to live in the north, out of the city."

"And so you are left alone, poor Marco!"

"Yes, my lady."

"Ah well. Change is coming. You will not be alone for long. The goddess will reward you for your offerings, and for your service to me."

"Most wise, I have done you no service?" It was a question, not a statement.

"Not yet, dear Marco, not yet."

* * *

_... her fingers stained black from reaching into too many minds..._

... and the mob was dancing, dark and beautiful...

The new queen was capricious. She used her gifts for sport. First, it was within her own retinue, as she had a pair of twins as pets. She would switch their minds between their bodies and see if the courtiers could tell the difference. Most could not. Some whispered that neither the queen nor the twins knew for sure which soul belonged where. The whisperers soon disappeared to the prisons below the city.

The new queen grew crueler. One of the guards refused to come to her bed, and she devised a twisted punishment. She trapped him in his own body, and gave over control to the mind of whore who was dying of the pox. The whore was grateful to live, of course.

The new queen became feared and hated, and over time her fingers were stained black from reaching into too many minds. She controlled the courtiers through fear, but out in the city there were pockets of unrest, and the spinner and the guards started to capture rebels and dissidents.

The priestess did not notice the growing unrest, for she was alternately numb and guilt-stricken, and her visions were trapped in the past with her thoughts. She distanced herself from court, coming only when her presence was requested. She prayed to her goddess for forgiveness, and took an apprentice. The priestess was not happy, but she did not think she deserved to be.

* * *

Nearly a year after the old queen died, the new queen summoned the priestess and her apprentice to court. As she knelt before the new queen, the priestess noticed that a great white wolf sat leashed to the throne.

"You have a new pet, my queen?"

"Oh, he is not particularly new, no," the queen said, drawing her blackened fingers through the wolf's white fur. "I begin to tire of him. It has been so long since you have come to court!" There was an edge in the new queen's voice, and the priestess noticed that the spinner was smiling, where she stood behind the throne.

"No, my queen. I have been busy training my new apprentice."

"So I see." The queen beckoned to the apprentice with the hand not petting the wolf. 

The priestess was suddenly afraid, but her apprentice stepped forward obediently. "Yes, my queen?"

"I need a new pet," the queen said, and she seized the apprentice by the chin, her stained fingers gripping cruelly tight.

The priestess cried out, again too late. The wolf convulsed, under the new queen's hand. Her apprentice convulsed under the new queen's hand.

They both howled, and went abruptly silent as they collapsed.

The queen laughed, delighted. "And now I shall have two new pets!"

* * *

"I did not laugh, you see? Well, I am sure that the spinner told her something else, that I was consorting with the rebels, but I think that I am here because I did not laugh."

Marco was very pale. "Oh, my _lady_..."

"I wronged my queen, it is true. And I wronged the spinner, and do not fault her her revenge. But oh, she has caught so many more than I in her web, and for that I am sorry."

* * *

_... yanking and pulling, rattling at the chains around her wrists and ankles ..._

... and the mob was dancing, dark and beautiful...

She was one of the rebels, and she had been discovered setting fire to the palace, walking along one of the long galleries, splashing the curtains with oil and lighting them on fire. She did not run when the guards shouted the alarm, she simply continued on to the next window, setting the dusty fabric alight. The guards grabbed her, tearing the oil and matches from her hands, and she did not resist them. 

The guards brought her to the new queen. They threw her down before the throne, and she lay there, her clothing torn, her shoulders bared, unmoving.

The new queen nudged her with the point of her boot. Nothing. A sharper kick. Still nothing.

The new queen stared for a long moment, and then sighed, tapping her fan idly against her chin. "She is boring. What has she done?"

"She has been starting fires, my queen," said one of the guards.

"Fires?" The new queen smiled. "Well then, let her burn! Execution by incineration on the next burning day. Take her away."

The guards lifted her up, and took her away, down below the city. She was locked in a low-ceilinged cell, tossed onto a chair and chained to the ground. The door clanged shut, and the lock slid home, and she was alone.

At the sound of the door, she reached forward and started yanking and pulling, rattling at the chains around her wrists and ankles.

* * *

"My lady?"

The priestess did not respond, standing stock still, staring up at the ceiling. 

"My lady, can you hear me?"

Abruptly, she shook her head, like one waking from a dream. "What? Hear what?"

"Most wise?"

"Oh," she blinked, pushing her fingers into her hair. "Oh, hello, Marco."

"She has arrived, my lady."

"Who has arrived?"

Marco hesitated. They were alone, but he leaned closer to the bars and kept his voice low. "The prisoner that you have foreseen, my lady..."

* * *

_... and the mob was dancing, dark and beautiful..._

There was a girl, her clothing torn, shoulders bared, brought out for execution, incineration. The mob came to watch. The court came to watch. The new queen came to watch.

They came to watch the execution of this girl, sentenced to die by incineration.

She was bound.

She was bound, and the fire was lit.

She was bound, and the fire was lit, but she did not burn.

And the mob was dancing, dark and beautiful...

And the mob was seizing, bright and uncontrollable...

And the mob was rioting, mad and deadly.

* * *

"The prisoner that you have foreseen, my lady. The prisoner who will be the next queen."

The priestess laughed. She clung to the bars of the cage, sagging against them. "Oh, oh, oh! Oh, the next queen, the new queen, the queen." She laughed until she wept. She wept until she laughed. "The queen is dead, Marco. Long live the queen."

 


End file.
